2016 04-27 SB Coast
Captain Dave ran two excursions along the Santa Barbara coast today. Conditions were a bit bumpy at first from strong winds to the far west Channel, but laid down for a while at the end of the morning trip and first part of the afternoon. We had good sightings of whales and dolphins. We also witnessed sea lions sink a boat.
9 am The Monroe School Mustangs and a few non-equine passengers joined up to make a nice crowd for watching lots of long-beaked common dolphins and one pair of gray whales, a mother and her calf. Very nice looks were had of this duo before turning offshore to visit with the 500+ dolphins.
12 noon Princess cruise ship whale lovers took the noon excursion. First we followed a mother gray whale and her calf from the cruise ship west to just about Hendry’s. The two were in very shallow water and played in the choppy surf near the beach. Around 1 pm we picked up a second pair of mother and calf gray whales along the Shoreline Park surf zone. As the winds chased us east, our keen-eyed deckhand Eric located a nice pod of 25 or so Pacific white-sided dolphins feeding near the surface with lots of birds circling and diving alongside. We continued our voyage east as refugees from the oncoming westerlies. Soon we were touring the East Beach anchorage and were surprised to find a large juvenile male Stellar sea lion resting on a mooring can. It was a beast. Nearby we also paid a visit to the dozen or more California sea lions that have taken command of two sailboats and a small dinghy. As you can see in the photograph above, the dinghy is almost fully submerged and heading for Davey Jones locker. Thus our headline sea lions sink a boat!
You never know what Mother Nature has in store. Bob Perry Condor Express
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